This is finally over then? Not...so...fast. We've still got Empyre: Immortal She-Hulk #1, Empyre: Aftermath Avengers #1, and Empyre: Fallout Fantastic Four #1. And you're probably thinking what I'm thinking: I thought She-Hulk was killed a few issues ago? Well, apparently she's back. The evil alien that took over her body is killed and She-Hulk is back as if nothing happened. Writer Al Ewing sure loves immortal hulks...as he's currently writing The Immortal Hulk. Marvel should really just call every superhero "immortal" since every time they die they just return. Hell, in this issue Wolverine and The Thing are running around and fighting...and they both died in "big" issues Marvel published in the last decade. Black Panther died in Empyre but he's suddenly alive in this issue and the reason is just about the stupidest thing I've ever heard. When he's asked how he's not dead he explains, "I slowed my heartbeat to almost nothing-- reducing blood loss-- until my ceremonial armor could patch my wounds." Ugh. Really? I can see how Marvel wouldn't want to kill off a character that's making them billions of dollars in Hollywood (although, Chadwick Boseman, who played Black Panther in the movie...died last week at 43 from colon cancer...so who knows if Black Panther 2 will ever happen)...but why pull off such a stupid trick? And they did it twice in this series, killing off She-Hulk and Black Panther only to reveal that, no, they weren't really dead. And since no one dies in this epic, it seems like kind of a lame, consequence-free event. Usually at least something drastic happens in these big comic book events. Nope. The bad guys lose and the good guys win. The sun was set to explode but somehow they solved that problem. I read this whole issue and still can't figure out how they did that. So the writing was atrocious. What about the art? Shockingly they got the same artist to pencil all six issues. I guess he started last Fall or something. That helps, as at least the whole thing looks the same. Usually by the end of these event books you have delays and issues with like ten artists as they attempt to get the things published before the end of time. Valerio Schiti did the pencils/inks and Marte Gracia did the colors and the book at least looks vibrant, albeit this particular issue looks a bit sloppier than the earlier ones. I think it's pretty safe to say that this event book was awful. It wasn't particularly entertaining. It didn't feature a single great scene or any great dialogue. There were way too many characters all over the world and the writing didn't exactly coherently present everything going on. DC Comics recently fired their publisher and have announced that starting next year they'll be cutting down the number of books published. That sounds like a good thing in theory. But this only means really good books that are weird or unique will never see the light of day. Marvel should at least wake the fuck up and try something like DC is doing because I'm tired of these terrible event books like Empyre being shoved down our throats every year. -No Stars-
